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Founder

Anatol Lysenka

Anatol Lysenka is Founder and Music Director of the Tutti Symphony Orchestra, Associate Conductor with American Music Festivals, and Principal Summer Conductor of the North Shore Chamber Orchestra.

Mr. Lysenka was born in Bobruisk, Belarus. He earned his first Master’s Degree in conducting at the Belarusian Conservatory of Music, and in 1985 received his second Master’s Degree in Opera-Symphony Conducting at Moscow State Conservatory. In 1990 he participated in the conducting class at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory under the distinguished Ilya Musin. Among his teachers were the outstanding musicians Yuri Simonov (Chief Conductor of Bolshoi Theater), I. Bukreev, and B. Maskevich. Anatol was awarded a first Prize for The Youth Symphony Orchestra Conducting in the Belarus Republic Contest in 1987.

Mr. Lysenka has participated in a number of major international and Belarusian festivals including the Spring Festival of Music, Belarusian Musical Autumn, Revival of Belarusian Chorus, and Music for Youth (where he did the world premiere of Wagner’s Symphony # 3). He has led the Belarusian TV Symphony Orchestra, Belarusian Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra, Belarusian Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra, Belarusian Conservatory Symphony Orchestra, Belarusian Lyceum Symphony Orchestra, Moscow State Orchestra, Tomsk Philharmonic Orchestra, Barnaul Philharmonic Orchestra, Yaroslavl Symphonic Orchestra, and the Kharkov Philharmonic Orchestra. In 2000 he participated in a conducting master class in Miskolc, Hungary, conducting the North Hungarian Symphony Orchestra.

Since coming to the U.S. in 2000, Anatol has conducted a number of orchestras in Illinois including the Lincolnwood Chamber Orchestra, Community Players Orchestra, and the Glenview Symphony. In 2005 he founded the Tutti Symphony Orchestra located in Skokie, IL. As Associate Conductor of American Music Festivals, Mr. Lysenka has distinguished himself by providing outreach and artistic leadership to the growing Russian and Eastern European immigrant community in Chicago, facilitating cultural exchange programs with numerous artists and organizations, both in the U.S. and abroad.

Among the prominent Belarussian musicians that have appeared in Chicago upon Mr. Lysenka’s invitation are Irina Grigorovich, cymbalon; pianist Ludmila Lakisova, clarinetist Evgeny Ovsyannikov, and the folk ensemble Zabava. Other artists he has collaborated with are American Music Festivals Artistic Director Philip Simmons, Girardo Ribiero (Northwestern University), Gary Stucka (Chicago Symphony), Andrew Schultze (University of Chicago), Alexander Zintchenko (DePaul University), Ashu, Donna Milanovich, Galina Breeva, and Yana Bourkova. An advocate for folk music and preserving cultural traditions, Mr. Lysenka has also presented several programs featuring Jewish folk music and artists, including a concert featuring Hazzan Sarah Barton Alexander.

Mr. Lysenka has been widely recognized for his orchestral arrangements. His arrangement of Shostakovich’s Prelude and Fugue No. 24 was premiered with the Glenview Symphony (2003), and subsequently performed by the Northwestern University Symphony Orchestra, Victor Yampolsky, Music Director. Anatol has also arranged for performance in the Chicago area music by Eugene Glebov (Adagio from the ballet "the Little Prince", Palessky Suite, Belorussian Souvenir), the Cymbalon Concertos of Dmiti Smolsky and Vladamir Kurian, and Lev Abeliovich’s Aria. Anatol strives to share his native culture through performances and adaptations of these works. Few conductors possess the level of advanced knowledge and expertise that Mr. Lysenka has in interpreting and performing the complex music of Shostakovich and other works by great 20th century Soviet and contemporary Belarusian composers. Recently, he completed an arrangement for full orchestra of Bach’s Fantasia and Fugue in G-minor, performed by the North Shore Chamber Orchestra.